Catalonia at the vanguard of drone development?

UAVs in Catalonia are highly ranked (4 out of the top 10 worldwide as per one research study). Reasons?

Catalonia has extensive drone history (since the 1980’s)

They have the BCN Drone Center (a specialist drone center with 2,500 hectares of segregated airspace for drone testing)

Accommodating laws (allowing UAVs of up to 25 kg to fly outdoors outside of cities and built up neighborhoods to height of 120 meters and withing 500 m of its pilot)

A government sponsored CataloniaSmartDrones working group (comprised of 25 companies and 16 organizations, including universities and research groups, and all working together on making the region drone-friendly)